Distinguishing pits from pit houses through daub analysis, the nature and location of early neolithic star cevo-cris houses at foeni-salas, romania

Abstract

A contentious issue in Central Balkan prehistory has been the nature and location of Early Neolithic domestic structures. Some researchers have argued for the existence of surface structures, while others have proposed pit houses. The problem to be addressed in this thesis is to determine the nature and location of Early Neolithic houses from archaeological sites in the Central Balkans through daub analysis. I will present a model for determining the nature and location of these houses based on the classification of construction daub from the Early Neolithic Starcevo-Cris site of Foeni-Salas in southwestern Romania. This analysis will be used to demonstrate that Early Neolithic houses at Foeni-Salas were semi-subterranean in nature and distributed in a semi-circle around a larger pit house and a central open space. These types of analyses are the first steps towards a more systematic investigation of Early Neolithic community patterning in the Central Balkans.